TB.Pensar 7

Your Guide to Design and Pop Culture in Tokyo

Jun 29, 2007

What is TB.Pensar? Find out here.

Well, here I am, writing this from Apple Store Ginza. This week’s updates from Apple have not been kind to my MacBook Pro, first the 10.4.10 update screwing with my wireless connection (Airport card) and battery, and then yesterday’s Superdrive firmware update killing it. I brought in my MBP this morning, and they will replace the drive, but it means I’m without my MBP until Sunday (if I’m lucky) or Monday — this also means that this Monday’s PauseTalk will not be using the projector. At least they were cool about it, and even though I’m out of warranty, they will replace the drive for free, since it happened because of their firmware update. I’ve never been so happy that my main working tools are Gmail and Google Documents. I think the only thing I really miss is access to Ecto, for all my web writing, since I find it a pain to deal with adding links while writing in the WordPress admin. Anyone know of a great web-based blog posting app?

Might as well take this opportunity to make a few announcements I’ve been wanting to do. It’s been a suprisingly (and I’m very happy this) hectic month, with lots of work keeping me very busy, from pieces for various publications, to trend tours (I do them occasionally, until now quite unofficially, but will probably make the service more official sometime soon), presentations, and things keep ramping up. As of next month, I am the new editor for the Tokyo edition of the SUPERFUTURE SUPERGUIDES. These are just great — and you really need to print one up and fold it to see to what extent — and I’m excited to be involved with the entire project. Currenty they are only available for Tokyo and New York, but plenty of cities are going to be added this year. Also, as of next week, I will become a regular contributor to Gizmodo, starting with 3 Japan-related posts a day, as well as a couple of features a month. Most readers know I’ve been involved with the Gawker family of sites for quite a while now (first Gizmodo a couple of years back, then Gridskipper, then Kotaku), and I’m happy to see that relationship grow even more.

I have a few other big projects on the go, which I’ll keep hush-hush for now, but let’s just say that the move to full-time freelancing is looking like it was a good one, making it an exciting and happy time for me right now.

Have something to add? Feel free to leave feedback through either Twitter or Facebook, or contact me by email.

Tagged:

PauseTalk is a regular series of events that take place at Cafe Pause on the first Monday of every month, with a start time of 20:00. The idea is to create a forum where Tokyo-based creatives can get together and discuss their own projects, as well as cultural currents of the city. The next edition is March 5.

We hereby define a new term, that of the magaziner, described as a person who exerts an unhealthy amount of love for all things magazine. The Magaziner is a site that mostly focuses on the intersection between magazines and the digital frontier, and what it means for the medium. This does not preclude the inclusion of a healthy amount of print love.

Codex is a weekly music podcast hosted by Jean Snow, recorded in Tokyo. Playlists for all episodes are posted on the site, and you can subscribe to RSS feeds of posts and episodes.

Jean Snow is a contributor to Arcade Mania, your guide to the arcade gaming scene in Japan (Amazon US/Amazon Japan). He also provided assistance on Tokyolife: Art and Design, a guide to Tokyo's cultural output of the past few years, covering the works of over 80 influential creatives.

He will be contributing to the upcoming fifth editions of The Rough Guide to Tokyo and The Rough Guide to Japan, due for release in 2011.

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Jean Snow is Executive Director of the PechaKucha organization. He also helps run the PechaKucha Night in Tokyo -- please get in touch if you are interested in presenting at a future event. For a more intimate salon-like discussion group, join him at his monthly PauseTalk event.

A longtime resident of Tokyo, he lives and breathes design, pop culture, and gaming, sustained by an unhealthy addiction to magazines and frequent visits to his favorites cafes. He has reported on these obsessions for various online/offline publications, including the following: Time, Inside (Australian Design Review), Gizmodo, Gridskipper, Kotaku, 1UP, Tokyo Q, Superfuture, OK Fred, Arthur Frommer's Budget Travel, I.D. (International Design), Metropolis, Azure, MoCo Loco, Kateigaho International Edition, Wired's Game|Life, PingMag, CNNGo, Phaidon, and The Japan Times.

You can subscribe to an RSS feed of this site, and also follow him on Twitter and Facebook, or get in touch by email.

He serves as editor-at-large at Néojaponisme, a web journal covering social and cultural aspects of Japan. Read the manifesto, by founder and chief editor W. David Marx.

He also writes a monthly column covering Japanese product design for The Japan Times, called "On Design." It appears on the last Tuesday of every month, in both the print edition and online.

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The "Jean Snow" logo is written using the free Kirimomi Swash typeface. The "M31" logo is by Ian Lynam, and is part of a series of 31 unique designs. The site's design is based on the Grid Focus WordPress theme by Derek Punsalan.